By this point, it's hard to give a fair analysis or review to Monster Cereal products.  The nostalgia has become too embedded in them to allow anyone to give an unbiased assessment.  And if, by the slimmest chance, you are able to give a fair review due to not having fond memories of Monster Cereals, it most likely means you are a heartless, awful person.

Nostalgia is the only reason I can think of that causes people to declare how much they love Boo Berry cereal.  It's not disgusting, it's just... not very good.  I reviewed the Monster lineup way back in 2004, and didn't understand the hype back then, either.

However, since that initial review, I have come to like Franken Berry much more, and it is probably tied with the Count for the top spot.  The Count's cache has decreased a bit since discovering that Chocolate Lucky Charms are almost identical.

I have also discovered indisputable evidence that Boo Berry is the worst of the three.  Since they have the same last name, we can assume that Franken and Boo Berry are brothers.  But when they both died, Franken was the one who was resurrected.  They just left Boo's corpse to rot.

Maybe when it came time to hit the "make this cereal awesome" button at the factory, Boo's ghostly hand passed right through and was unable to press it.

That said, I don't hate Boo Berry - he seems like a nice enough ghost.

Since I love Halloween and Monster Cereals, and since fruit rolls make up approximately 30% of my diet, it makes sense that I'd finally get around to trying the Monster Cereals Fruit Roll-Ups.  And since it would be awkward to only review two-thirds of the group, Count Chocula's Treats get to come along for the reviewing ride.

I hope you really enjoyed that long introduction to the review, because there's not going to be too much to say about all three of these.

Franken Berry's Fruit Roll-Ups come in an intensely pink box.  One very noticeable peculiarity is that Franken paints strawberries on his fingernails.  I buy that he has pink-hued skin, but no way are those strawberry fingernails natural.  He did that.

I also never understood why Franken apparently has goggles bolted onto his face.  That's not a Frankenstein thing.  But he also has steam gauges and pipes coming out of his head, so I guess they sort of went their own way when designing him.

Oh yeah, the Franken Berry Fruit-Roll Up.  It's called "Strawberry Scream", but it's just a strawberry Fruit Roll-Up.  So, there you go.

I assumed that the Fruit Roll-Ups were covered in temporary tattoos, but I wasn't too impressed with them.  I stamped myself with the Franken in a circle, at the top left corner.  It came out like this:

It just looks like I went to a club the night before.  And since I find that concept much more embarrassing than the concept of stamping myself with Fruit Roll-Up tattoos, I am rather disappointed.

Up next is the other friendly ghost's offering.

I have to say, I am not liking Boo Berry's current look.  He used to look like this:

He was a happy ghost, with a bow tie and a hobo hat.  He still has the hat and bow tie, but they look poorly put together.  Also, looks like he is now a recovering alcoholic.  Look at those dark circles under his eyes!  And considering ghosts can't even metabolize alcohol, I'm not sure how he even managed to get addicted.  Lightweight.  (Rim shot!)

Boo's flavor is "Razzle Boo Blitz", which is just a re-theme of an existing Fruit Roll-Up flavor.  I can't 100% tell if the flavor is Blastin' Berry Hot Colors or Tropical Tie-Dye.  I'm leaning more towards Blastin' Berry, especially because of it having berry in its name.

I've always liked those flavors a lot more than strawberry, so in the Fruit Roll-Up field of battle, Boo takes a rare victory over Franken.

Finally, we have the Count.  Immediately, his lack of effort annoyed me.  When I saw that the Berry brothers had Fruit Roll-Ups, I was briefly excited at the prospect of the return of Pudding Roll-Ups.

We've had chocolate Roll-Ups before, and we need them again.  And the Count was the man to bring them back.  Instead, he came with a pathetic offering of a glorified granola bar.

I really like some of General Mills's Treats bars.  The Golden Grahams one is insanely good.  The Cinnamon Toast Crunch Treats?  Surprisingly not good.  So while I was incredibly disappointed over the Count not coming correct with a chocolate roll, I was willing to give this a shot.

And it's... very mediocre.  It's a Kudos bar with some Count Chocula pieces mashed in there.  Poor show, Count.

So Boo comes out on top in the Monsters' side project lineup.  Hopefully that will boost his spirit (rim shot again) enough so he can kick the booze habit and regain his healthy appearance from the past.